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Thursday, May 30, 2013

Rogers here, I saw a great blog post on "railroading" the other day and the author has agreed to share it right here on the Magnificent Bastards blog!

I came upon this tactic back in the early days of 8th edition. I was trying to get my wild clan Skaven army to work with the new rules. It was in one of these games that my Abomination pursued big and I found him sandwiched between a pillar on one side and a unit of dark elf spearmen on the other! After a couple minutes of scratching my head, it was clear I could only shoot ahead in my next move phase. The turn after that, I'd get to spin back around to clobber spearmen. This stuck with me, although the skaven did not. (Just couldn't get my clanrat spearmen, rat ogres, doom flayers and plague censer bearers to do much. ;)

In any case, this tactic is useful against most random movers. Here is Gas_Monkey82 to tell you how to pull her off!Railroading

So after this game up in one of my games at Tauranga – I thought I’d cover it. Railroading, an effective technique for controlling random movers. Below is a diagram of how it works. You position units either side of the random mover out of its front arc 1” away both sides. You can just do one side if you have a board edge or other piece of impassable terrain and it works just as well. This forces the random move to move straight forward only as like a railroad track.

Following the first rule below – 1” apart the random mover when it comes to pivot second rule, can’t do so as it would come within 1” of the enemy units either side of it. This means they can only move straight ahead in the direction shown in the red arrow.

The random mover is unable to contact the “railroaders” as they don’t lie within its front arc so moving on in the random movers wording we get this if through moving straight ahead they would contact an enemy unit then it is - “resolved using the normal rules for charges.”

Ok – still with me? We move on the charges rules “the target must lie at least partially within the charging unit’s front arc.” So in this case – the random mover can’t pivot and can’t contact them thus giving you the tactic below.

P13 - 1” Apart

“Whilst moving, a unit is not allowed to approach closer than 1” to another unit friend or foe, or impassable terrain.”

PG74 – Random Movement

“When the model moves, first pivot it about its centre to face the direction in which you wish to travel.”

“Then, roll the dice shown in the models profile. Finally move the model directly forwards a number of dice equal to the total rolled by the dice. No other pivots can be made.”

“There’s a chance that the model’s peculiar movement will cause it to come into contact with an enemy, so measure the distance in a straight line before the model is moved. If the move is found to take the unit into contact with an enemy then it count’s as charging, and this is resolved using the normal rules for charges.”

Page 16 – Declare charge

“one or more of the models in your unit must be able to trace a line of sight to the enemy unit, and the target must lie at least partially within the charging unit’s front arc.”

Rogers here again, big thanks to Edward! (@Gas_Monkey82 on twitter)Check out his excellent blog NZ Hammered! And his original post here for some interesting comments.

I've taken a look at that doc before. The only move I've seen performed out of there is the double eagle cockblock (performed by the Mag Bastards very own Domus).

To be honest, the rest really require a vaccuum to properly pull off, ie. they are ignoring the rest of the opponent's army that can take your blocker units out as they attempt to move into these very specific places on the battlefield.

Same with the railroad. Either entice the blockers in, suck it up for a turn and counter them or just put units to the flanks of your Abom/Stank to prevent someone from moving into position.